The MLB lockout is lifted!

[pcq]

Blockbuster minor league deals galore.

[CWSpalehoseCWS]

51 minutes ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

It wouldn't come close to doing that.  What it would do is force those teams to actually spend some of the giant pile of money they make instead of simply lining the owners pockets and then crying poor to anyone who will listen.  

All conjecture. There is no way to prove that would actually come to fruition. They could just as easily line their pockets - only difference is they would be permanently bad. 

[hi8is]

This sucks.

[poppysox]

2 hours ago, CWSpalehoseCWS said:

Zero reason the 9th best team deserves the #1 overall pick. That system would end up permanently burring teams like the Pirates, Orioles, etc.

Baseball needs to adopt similar methods that we see with other leagues. The lottery would be interesting for the top 5 or so picks. Also, allow picks to be traded. This one alone would prevent the need to tank a roster for years. The draft's purpose is to give bad/terrible teams a sense of hope for the future, not reward mediocrity or a "just not quite good enough" effort.

I like your idea of trading picks.

[Balta1701]

2 hours ago, poppysox said:

Except for raising the minimum wage for a couple of players, I don't see anything that will help current Sox players in a meaningful way.  Get more bucks for the guys hampered by qualifying offers along with earlier FA I guess.  Not much incentive for the average ballplayer to want to endure a long sit-out.  I would like to see the minimum raised to something more substantial like 1 million and the team minimum raised substantially in order to have a more equal playing field.  Some reworking of the rules to avoid a Brandt situation and universal DH and I would be good to go.  I am not in favor of changing the playoff format or adding teams for that matter.  We already have teams unable to compete because not operating in substantial markets.  The disparity in payrolls is just plain unfair.  

The universal DH also benefits the players. The only thing in that package that would benefit the owners is more playoff revenue, and you don’t want that. In other words, you support the players’ requests so strongly that you can’t endorse a single thing the owners would want, but you still want to say both sides must be at fault?

[Balta1701]

43 minutes ago, poppysox said:

I like your idea of trading picks.

The thought has always been that if you allow that, the Pirates will package their top pick with a Gregory Polanco and make their organization worse while making themselves more profitable.

This is also extremely relevant for the White Sox as we have in recent years seen them give up on the international signing market when they had money to spend and trade that space to Texas to get them to absorb Nate Jones’s deal. That was effectively like giving up a mid round draft pick for money.

[mmmmmbeeer]

Pretty much sums up this lock out

[hi8is]

19 minutes ago, mmmmmbeeer said:

Pretty much sums up this lock out

Yep.

[Harold's Leg Lift]

14 hours ago, CWSpalehoseCWS said:

All conjecture. There is no way to prove that would actually come to fruition. They could just as easily line their pockets - only difference is they would be permanently bad. 

It takes away the excuse that a team is losing now and pocketing a shit ton of money in the process so they can be good at *insert a date that never comes*. 

[Dick Allen]

12 hours ago, Balta1701 said:

The thought has always been that if you allow that, the Pirates will package their top pick with a Gregory Polanco and make their organization worse while making themselves more profitable.

This is also extremely relevant for the White Sox as we have in recent years seen them give up on the international signing market when they had money to spend and trade that space to Texas to get them to absorb Nate Jones’s deal. That was effectively like giving up a mid round draft pick for money.

I think tanking for draft picks is overrated. The Sox rebuild  is 5 years old, the picks in which they tanked to get, Collins, Burger, Madrigal,  Vaughn, and Crochet haven't up to this point contributed much to winning. If and when they eventually do, that's great, but  you aren't going to quickly rebuild relying on 1st round picks.Only 1 first pick in the draft since 2016 had played in the major leagues through the 2021 season.  The MLB draft is getting better, but it's still the biggest crapshoot  of all sports drafts.

[Harold's Leg Lift]

Teams don't tank for draft picks.  That's the grand illusion.  They tank so they can have a low major league payroll and make a bunch of money.  It's an easy built-in excuse and if it happens to work out all the better but the only reason to do it is to make more money.

[Dick Allen]

25 minutes ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

Teams don't tank for draft picks.  That's the grand illusion.  They tank so they can have a low major league payroll and make a bunch of money.  It's an easy built-in excuse and if it happens to work out all the better but the only reason to do it is to make more money.

Of course.  And if JRs goal is to break even like he has stated hundreds of times, there is a lot of money he needs to spend. 

Franchises aren't worth billions if they can barely turn a profit if they are lucky,  like most owners want you to believe.

 

[Balta1701]

41 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

I think tanking for draft picks is overrated. The Sox rebuild  is 5 years old, the picks in which they tanked to get, Collins, Burger, Madrigal,  Vaughn, and Crochet haven't up to this point contributed much to winning. If and when they eventually do, that's great, but  you aren't going to quickly rebuild relying on 1st round picks.Only 1 first pick in the draft since 2016 had played in the major leagues through the 2021 season.  The MLB draft is getting better, but it's still the biggest crapshoot  of all sports drafts.

Of course that could just be a specific issue with the quality of the White Sox’s drafting, which is something we have heard with this organization for two decades. The Astros tanked  and as a consequence drafted Springer, Correa, Tucker, Bregman, McCullers. And a lot of their trade chips. They also signed Valdez, Garcia, Urquidy, and Javier with their international dollars in those years - the money the White Sox couldn’t find anything to use it on so they sent it away to the Rangers. 

A student who doesn’t work hard might do just fine when they can cheat on the homework using someone else’s top 100 prospect list, but they will flop on the test when they can only rely on themselves.

[Dick Allen]

6 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

Of course that could just be a specific issue with the quality of the White Sox’s drafting, which is something we have heard with this organization for two decades. The Astros tanked  and as a consequence drafted Springer, Correa, Tucker, Bregman, McCullers. And a lot of their trade chips. They also signed Valdez, Garcia, Urquidy, and Javier with their international dollars in those years - the money the White Sox couldn’t find anything to use it on so they sent it away to the Rangers. 

A student who doesn’t work hard might do just fine when they can cheat on the homework using someone else’s top 100 prospect list, but they will flop on the test when they can only rely on themselves.

The Astros also drafted Appel and Aiken. As I pointed out there is only 1 number one pick overall who has played in the major leagues since 2016, and that was Mize, who will probably be really good one day, but his current performance wouldn't lead a team that is close to the playoffs. 

[Balta1701]

40 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

The Astros also drafted Appel and Aiken. As I pointed out there is only 1 number one pick overall who has played in the major leagues since 2016, and that was Mize, who will probably be really good one day, but his current performance wouldn't lead a team that is close to the playoffs. 

And they realized something was amiss with Aiken and magically turned him into Bregman.

I would also say that “no first draft pick has made the big leagues since 2016” is a helluva BS way to point things out given the last year and a half. The 2019 number 1 pick was a catcher (who tend to need extra time), he’s now the #1 prospect in baseball by MLB.com. The 2017 number 1 pick was a top 10 prospect at one point, is only 22 years old, and is down right now  from a major injury. 2018 made it this year. And oh yeah…none of them played any baseball in 2020 because of a virus!

[Dick Allen]

14 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

And they realized something was amiss with Aiken and magically turned him into Bregman.

I would also say that “no first draft pick has made the big leagues since 2016” is a helluva BS way to point things out given the last year and a half. The 2019 number 1 pick was a catcher (who tend to need extra time), he’s now the #1 prospect in baseball by MLB.com. The 2017 number 1 pick was a top 10 prospect at one point, is only 22 years old, and is down right now  from a major injury. 2018 made it this year. And oh yeah…none of them played any baseball in 2020 because of a virus!

No, it just points out MLB isn't the NBA or NFL or even NHL. There is rarely instant gratification after drafting someone. 

And speaking of BS, you say the Sox don't know how to draft with one hand, then make excuses why 1 overall #1 between 2016-20 made the majors in 2021, yet without a #1 overall, every Sox 1st rounder between 2016-20 made the majors covid and all. Pick a lane.

Edited December 11, 2021 by Dick Allen

[southsider2k5]

1 hour ago, Balta1701 said:

Of course that could just be a specific issue with the quality of the White Sox’s drafting, which is something we have heard with this organization for two decades. The Astros tanked  and as a consequence drafted Springer, Correa, Tucker, Bregman, McCullers. And a lot of their trade chips. They also signed Valdez, Garcia, Urquidy, and Javier with their international dollars in those years - the money the White Sox couldn’t find anything to use it on so they sent it away to the Rangers. 

A student who doesn’t work hard might do just fine when they can cheat on the homework using someone else’s top 100 prospect list, but they will flop on the test when they can only rely on themselves.

Our center fielder is a bit confused.

[Balta1701]

17 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

No, it just points out MLB isn't the NBA or NFL or even NHL. There is rarely instant gratification after drafting someone. 

And speaking of BS, you say the Sox don't know how to draft with one hand, then make excuses why 1 overall #1 between 2016-20 made the majors in 2021, yet without a #1 overall, every Sox 1st rounder between 2016-20 made the majors covid and all. Pick a lane.

Ok here’s my lane. “Casey Mize and Adley Rutchsman didn’t move up through the minors as fast as they should have and that’s entirely their fault and reflects on all number 1 picks because nothing unusual or unexpected happened since they were drafted” is one helluva strange take. 

[Balta1701]

13 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

Our center fielder is a bit confused.

Huh? The White Sox were out of the penalty box in 2019. They had a big international pool and 2 years in the penalty box they could have used to prepare. They worked so hard that they had a million dollars in international space remaining and traded that to the Rangers so the Rangers could sign a guy they scouted. What does that have to do with their Center Fielder other than making the team around him worse?

 

[southsider2k5]

40 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

Huh? The White Sox were out of the penalty box in 2019. They had a big international pool and 2 years in the penalty box they could have used to prepare. They worked so hard that they had a million dollars in international space remaining and traded that to the Rangers so the Rangers could sign a guy they scouted. What does that have to do with their Center Fielder other than making the team around him worse?

 

The center fielder we signed on the international market seems to argue that we found something to do with their money.

[Balta1701]

7 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

The center fielder we signed on the international market seems to argue that we found something to do with their money.

Not in 2019. They had 3 years to prepare for that, but even with that, scouting guys to spend all their money on was too much work. 

But hey, it’s not like the White Sox have one of the worst minor league systems in baseball now, so they did plenty of work and very much deserve their juice boxes.

[southsider2k5]

7 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

Not in 2019. They had 3 years to prepare for that, but even with that, scouting guys to spend all their money on was too much work. 

But hey, it’s not like the White Sox have one of the worst minor league systems in baseball now, so they did plenty of work and very much deserve their juice boxes.

The rebuild only happened in 2019?  News to me.

[Dick Allen]

16 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

Not in 2019. They had 3 years to prepare for that, but even with that, scouting guys to spend all their money on was too much work. 

But hey, it’s not like the White Sox have one of the worst minor league systems in baseball now, so they did plenty of work and very much deserve their juice boxes.

If every team had their first round pick from 2016-2020 graduate, would they still be one of the worst?

I personally really don’t care where their farm system is ranked, just as long as the team in Chicago wins games. 

Edited December 11, 2021 by Dick Allen

[hi8is]

32 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

personally really don’t care where their farm system is ranked, just as long as the team in Chicago wins games. 

This is now the way.

[Balta1701]

2 hours ago, southsider2k5 said:

The rebuild only happened in 2019?  News to me.

So they signed one international player and that means they never have to work at it again, cigars and money are the way now?